Mass Effect Fraternisation

Shepard was such a hypocritical ass.

He'd badgered Jack into wearing this stupid tank top, but then sat there watching her describe her tattoos with way more than an academic interest, his eyes darting to her breasts when he thought she wasn't looking.

When she was done he grabbed a hock of his blood coloured hair and pulled it out in front of his eyes. "This is the closest I ever came to getting a tattoo," he said. "It's more an embarrassing reminder of what a poser I was as a kid than anything else though. But I always saw my scars as a record of my past. I hate that Cerberus got rid of them all when they turned me into _this_." He gestured across his body, which in Jack's opinion wasn't looking too bad for a reanimated corpse.

"Shepard, have you looked in a mirror lately?" said Jack. "You've got enough weird-ass glowing scars on your face to light up a space station."

Shepard ran his hand over the cracks in his face, a sickly orange light flickering against his strong brown fingers. His scars were certainly striking, especially when combined with the hair and his stupid little goatee. Jack felt a little jealous sometimes, _she_ could never get her eyes to glow red like that. She wondered if he'd been as good at bullying people into intimidation when he'd just been a regular looking guy. "Wow, so I do," said Shepard. "And if you wake up tomorrow and Cerberus has replaced your tattoos with some weird cybernetic crap I'm sure you'll be overjoyed."

Jack snorted. She'd like to see them try.

"Anyway," he said, "I have to go. But we should do this again." He started to walk away, his heavy boots making the metal floor clang like cracked bells.

Screw that. She wasn't his personal interest story to pump for tales of angst and drama and then leave. "Wait," said Jack. "My turn with the questions." Shepard stopped but didn't turn around, arrogant bastard. Jack scowled at his back. "People usually walk by now. Why are you really asking all these things? You eyeing me up? Because if this is just about sex, maybe you should just fucking say so."

_That_ made him turn around, wearing that goddamned self-satisfied smirk on his freaky glowing face.

"I can't just want to get to know my crew?" he asked.

Yeah right. "What is it," she asked "You have a fetish for being told to fuck off?"

"No," he said, leaning against a pillar. "I have a _fetish_ for not being fucked with." Shepard seemed tired, there was an edge of fatigue in his voice and he was slumped ungracefully against the wall of metal like he wished it was a pillow, but he still watched the room with an edgy alertness. One of the things Jack liked about Shepard was how jumpy he was, a soldier can go back to their happy safe little life after the battle is over but Shepard had the look of someone who'd grown up never knowing when or where the next knife in the back was coming from (and from what she'd read in his file, this had been true) He looked her wearily in the eye, his face a glow of orange and red in the darkness. "Most of the people on this crew, they have some pretty story about how they're serving the greater good, how all the killing and torture and bullshit they've done, or that Cerberus has done, is _necessary_ and _good_. It creeps me out. You don't pretend to kill people for any higher purpose, you just do it. And you don't think it makes you better than other people like that psycho Zaeed."

"Ok, now you've hurt my feelings," said Jack. "I totally think I'm better than other people, because I am. And I am _at least_ as psycho as Zaeed. He only kills people for _money_."

"Yeah, maybe," said Shepard, sliding off the pillar into an upright position. "Still, you're a lot less likely to side with Cerberus if push comes to shove. Anyway, like I said, I have to go, if you want to play twenty questions we can talk later."

"Whatever," said Jack.

Jack was all ready to tell Shepard to go fuck himself the next time he visited, but then he didn't, he was always off saving the galaxy or helping the Cerberus cheerleader with her daddy issues or something. Having nothing better to do, she took to hassling the tech dorks in the engine room. The guy was a dick, but he was fun to mess with, and sometimes she could even get the other two to help.

Jack sat cross legged on the cold floor, watching the great big ball of eezo powering the ship do whatever it was that it did. It was actually kind of pretty in here, pity about the company. "So, Cerberus boy" she said to McWhatshisname. "Killed any babies lately?"

"Not recently," he said, not looking up from his console. "How about you, Miss I blew up a space station?"

Jack rolled her eyes. What a douche. "I never blew up a space station," she said. "I crashed it into a moon, get your facts straight. And I don't know, maybe. It's hard to keep track. What about you in the suit? Do you think we should count all the geth you've killed as baby AIs?"

"Only if we count husks as baby reapers," said Tali. "Forgive me if I don't lose any sleep over either of them. Anyway, this is an unpleasant topic."

"I like unpleasant topics."

"Well, you're outnumbered," said the other one. Gabby. "Before you got here we were having a nice conversation about how to balance the Gilbourne coefficients to compensate for the gravimetric profile of the new armour reinforcements. You know, like regular people."

"Screw you," said Jack. She jumped up off the floor and left the lot of them to their coefficients or whatever. This is what she got for trying to be friendly. Jack didn't do the friend thing. And she definitely didn't do the friend thing with people from Cerberus. But there were a few people on the Normandy she didn't _completely_ hate and mistrust, and Tali was one of them. Jack had trouble believing that anyone was _really_ that nice, but Tali's hatred of Cerberus seemed pretty sincere, and she could be endearingly bloodthirsty if you got her on the right subject.

She was also one of the few people who actually bothered to visit Jack down in her little hidey hole, even if it was usually only to check that Jack wasn't asleep when they were about to do some loud test with the engines. Even that perky Cerberus slimeball Kelly had given up after Jack threatened to throw her against the wall a few times.

Tali followed Jack downstairs a little while after she stormed off. After making sure that Jack wasn't in one of her particularly homicidal moods Tali made a vain attempt to convince Jack that the engineers didn't hate her.

"Save your breath," said Jack. "Even if they went down on one knee and proposed a three way marriage that wouldn't change the fact that _I_ hate _them_."

"I can understand that, I guess," said Tali, running her fingers along the conduits in the wall. She sure did love that engine, it was just a little bit creepy. "I like Ken and Gabby, and I find it hard to imagine them doing anything really immoral, but they did choose to work for Cerberus."

"So did you," said Jack.

"No," said Tali firmly. "I chose to work for _Shepard_."

Of course Shepard came to see Jack again eventually. He came at night, after the others had gone to bed, and leaned in close across the girders, his hand tight around the pipe near her bed. "I need to ask you about something," he said.

"You got a lot of questions, don't you?," said Jack. Before he could continue she held up her hand. "Been thinking. We've seen a lot of shit together now. And you're always coming to talk to me." She looked up, trying to judge his expression. He looked impatient, mostly, god forbid she ask _him_ any questions. "Shepard, you got feelings for me? 'Cause I don't need the complication."

"Then don't worry," he said. "I'm not interested, and I don't need the complication either."

"Good," said Jack. It was good right? So why did she feel crappy? Oh hell, _she_ didn't have feelings for _him_ did she? Sure, he was kind of hot in a weird, stocky sort of way but…ack. Maybe she'd just miss the attention. How sad was that? God, and now she was trying to explain herself to him, this was just pathetic.

"Go away," she said. "I don't want you coming around here for a while."

Shepard's impatient expression twisted into annoyance. "For the love of…Jack, I didn't come down here to try to get into your pants. In case you hadn't noticed, we're at _war_ with _genocidal robot spaceships_. And if you're not too busy swooning over me I want to discuss some worries I have about the latest intel we got from Cerberus."

Shitshitshit. "Right," she said. "Fine." How had she misjudged things? Goddamn Shepard messing with her head. "But then…why me? What the hell do I know about this crap? And why come here in the middle of the night?"

"You're one of the few people I can trust to not to be in on it if Cerberus is up to something," he said, leaning back a little but still speaking fairly quietly. Which…felt really nice to hear, actually. It had been a while since anyone had actually trusted her, and a lot longer before that since anyone had been right to. "I already talked to Tali and Garrus," he continued. Because…of course he had. Right. Stupid to think otherwise. "They…tend to think I'm being paranoid. Maybe I am. If _you_ think I should give Cerberus the benefit of the doubt I'll know I'm being oversuspicious."

Ah, so that was her role. The crazy anti-Cerberus psycho. Well, it was a role she was well qualified for. "You sure you can trust _them_?" she asked.

"What? Yes, definitely. Garrus has this weird turian thing with authority figures, but he has my back. And Tali …" Shepard got this far away look in his eye, and suddenly a lot of things made sense: the way he'd rushed off to recruit Tali the first chance he got, how he seemed to distrust pretty much everyone but was always sticking up for quarians, even the fact that he kept coming down here. Jack's place was only just down the stairs from the engineering bay, after all, no reason he wouldn't come visit her if he was in the area anyway. It hurt a little, but at least she understood where things stood a bit better.

"Has a great rack?" finished Jack, trying not to sound bitter. "Anyway, fine, I get it. You trust them, you trust me, you're not sure if you trust Cerberus about this turian distress beacon." She actually thought about it for a second. It did seem kind of fishy. But on the other hand it would be pretty stupid for Cerberus to go to all this effort to resurrect Shepard and this ship only to send them off to be blown up by the Collectors for a second time. And as much as she hated Cerberus, they weren't _stupid_, not most of the time anyway. "Ah, I don't know, Shepard. Strategy isn't my thing, I just kill stuff. They probably are up to something, but who can tell. And what are you going to do, _not_ check it out?"

"Right," said Shepard. "Yeah, that was what I was thinking. I guess if they stab us in the back we can at least have the satisfaction of being right."

"Great," said Jack. "I look forward to it. Can I go to sleep now?"

There was that goddamn smirk again. Screw him. She stood up before he'd quite had the chance to leave.

"You know what, stop. I can sleep later," she said, grabbing his arm. "I'm not imagining things, you're playing me Shepard and I don't like it. You got other things going on, and you do this whole innocent act, but I know when someone's interested. Stop screwing with me."

Shepard glowered and shrugged of her arm. "I'm not…" He started to deny it and then looked away. Jack felt a warm glow of satisfaction. Now we were getting somewhere. "Ok. Fine," he said, grudgingly. "I'm attracted to you. You're a very attractive woman, even when you're not walking around half naked. If circumstances were different, I don't know, maybe something could happen. But like you said, we don't need the complication." His mouth twisted like he'd eaten something sour. "I've had sex with my crew before and it always ends badly." Jack wondered if he was talking about that asari back on Ilium, there'd definitely been a weird vibe going on there. Not that she cared.

Shepard sighed and rubbed his face and then looked at Jack with something almost approaching apology. "Still, I'm sorry if I've been giving off mixed signals. I'll try to be more professional."

"Yeah, well," she said. "I don't want you coming down here to ogle some skin when you're bored of flirting with your shrink-wrapped girlfriend, whether you're being 'professional' about it or not."

"Wait," said Shepard, no longer trying to keep his voice low. "First you accuse me of coming on to you, now you're jealous? Now who's giving mixed signals?" Ok, so, maybe he had a point there. "Plus…Tali? Really? She's a quarian, even sex with you would be less dangerous."

Jack laughed. "You've never had sex with a quarian?" she said. "You know you don't have to get them out of the suit, right? They come with _attachments_."

Ha, from the look on his face this possibility had never occurred to him. He rallied quickly though. "I…it doesn't matter. Like you said, it's too much of a complication. And Tali wouldn't…" Shepard stopped, and for a moment Jack could see the big wibbling ball of marshmallow angst he hid beneath his tough guy exterior. It was kind of embarrassing.

Jack rolled her eyes. She thought about pointing out that ever since Shepard had saved Tali from exile you couldn't speak a word of criticism about him in front of her without Tali going on some little spiel about how brave and strong and _amazing_ Shepard was, but screw them. Probably better off without each other anyway.

"You know, I saw inside a quarian's suit once," she said. "One pissed me off so I killed him and cracked him open. Pretty disappointing, I have to say. At least volus explode."

"Yeah but volus have that terrible chemical smell," said Shepard, refusing to take the bait. "I think the only grosser thing to have explode in your face are baby rachni."

"Seriously, rachni?" said Jack. "Either you're even older than you look or you're full of shit. Go away and let me sleep." 

* * *

Ethan ducked under a bulkhead and headed towards Jack. She was sitting on her cot staring pensively off into space. She looked up quickly at his approach and narrowed her eyes into an expression of wariness.

"So," he said. "You enjoying the satisfaction of being right?"

"I thought I told you to go away," she said. "But no, not really. Fucking Cerberus. Why are we working with them again?"

"They're marginally better than the Reapers," he replied.

"Hmm. Maybe," said Jack. She looked pensive again. Even she had been shaken by the things they'd seen on the Collector ship.

Ethan was struck by how pretty Jack was, her eyes dark and expressive in her pale round face. Ah well, there were other pretty girls, most of them less likely to try and split his skull if he pissed them off. Pus he liked her enough to think she deserved someone who wouldn't make her trust issues _worse_.

This whole not having sex with Jack thing was working out surprisingly well, all told. She still wasn't exactly friendly but Ethan was pretty sure that if he had taken her up on her offer they'd already have progressed to hating each other by now. After the whole mess with Ashley and Liara he'd resolved not to sleep with any more of his crew, it always ended up with the girl (or, very occasionally, Ethan) getting overinvested and heartbroken and then it was all awkward meetings in the hallways and silent glares over mission briefings for months on end.

That said, as the mission drew on Ethan was starting to think about changing his resolution to "no sex with anyone he worked with directly". There were some cute analysts who kept smiling at him in the tech labs and if worst came to worst he could always get Cerberus to transfer them to another project.

"I should go," he said. "I want to check on the rest of the crew."

"Again?" said Jack "Shepard, you make a big show about being a hardass, but you're such a pushover. You're always asking people about their feelings and saving kittens stuck in trees and shit. You planning on defeating the Collectors with the power of hugs?"

"Yes," said Ethan. "Hugs and really big guns."

Jack was right of course. Sure, he'd grown up shifting back and forth between various institutions and living on the streets, and you didn't come out of that with many sentimental illusions about the world being fair. He'd spent the entirety of his decade of service as an Alliance officer constantly irritated by the other soldier's naive idealism and mindless obedience towards authority. But now that he was back in a world of criminal thugs and corporate mercenaries he was remembering why he'd left to join the Alliance in the first place. The people here held to to their own sort of naivete and mindless trust in authority, except now it was a belief that vicious bullies were "strong" and "willing to bend the rules to get things done". It wasn't that Ethan had a problem with violence, but he didn't see any point in romanticising it. And it kind of took the fun out of being a bastard when even at his nastiest Ethan looked like a teddy bear compared to people like Jack and Zaeed.

As he came out of his reverie Ethan realised he'd somehow he'd taken the wrong turn at the top of the stairs and ended up in engineering rather than heading towards the elevator. The door opened to the entirely welcome view of Tali's back.

Despite being by far the least provocatively dressed of the female crew Tali still managed to distract him whenever she was around. Ethan wondered if it was the allure of the unattainable and tried not to think about Jack's comment about attachments. Beyond that, seeing Tali just made him _happy_. He'd enjoyed her company on the old Normandy, but something about dying and coming back into a body and ship that weren't quite right had made him desperately glad to see her on Freedom's Progress, a familiar face (well, helmet) that made him feel at home in a way that Joker and Chakwas and the Normandy herself had not. Talking to Tali was a reminder that there was more to the universe than cruelty and horror in the name of selfishness or the greater good.

"Hey Tali," he said. "Do you have a moment to talk?"

"Of course!" she said with a smile in her voice.

It didn't take long for Ethan to start mentally cursing the fact that Tali's helmet made it impossible to judge her expression. Was she _flirting_ with him? Or was Jack's innuendo just getting into his head? He felt an intense and unexpected spike of terror. He _liked_ Tali, and he liked that there was no possibility of things getting complicated between them. It was one thing to flirt with the lab techs or even Jack, but Tali…he didn't want to drive Tali away, or have her look at him with the same sad desolation he'd seen in Liara's eyes on Ilium. Better to assume she didn't mean anything by it. 

* * *

The volus shook his fist at Ethan. "I am a biotic GOD!" he cried. "An ill wind blows upon Wasea, captain of the Eclipse sisters! After me!"

Shepard raised an eyebrow. He might not be the galaxy's most powerful biotic, but he wasn't going to be mocked by _this_ guy.

"He needs help," said Tali, sounding sympathetic.

Ethan sighed and knocked the volus on the head.

Jack snickered. _Pushover_ she mouthed at him. 

* * *

Ethan wasn't exactly sure where he'd gone wrong with this conversation. He'd been expressing sympathy for Tali's recent illness, and then they'd had an interesting discussion about quarian immune systems, but now suddenly she was talking in significant tones about linking suits and trust and a willingness for _intimacy_.

He thought about pretending not to notice. Tali was no Jack, if he let it slide she wouldn't press the issue and they could go on as they were. That would certainly be the sensible thing to do.

But Ethan had never been entirely sensible. Anyway, this uncertainty was driving him crazy. Now that the idea had been put into his head he'd found himself becoming increasingly maudlin about Tali, wondering what it would be like to touch her and looking for significance in her every word and gesture. Maybe it would be better to get things out in the open.

"Wait a minute," said Ethan. "It sounds like you're suggesting something, Tali."

Tali leaned back against the console and looked up at him, arms crossed. "What could I possibly be suggesting?" she said, coyly. "I mean, a young woman gets rescued by a dashing commander who lets her join his crew and then goes off to save the galaxy?" She stood up again and stepped towards Ethan, lowering her voice. "How could she possibly develop any kind of interest in him?"

Seeming to become aware of what she was saying Tali coughed and moved back slightly, then took a sudden interest in the pressure indicators on the wall. Ethan got the distinct impression that if she were human she'd be blushing.

Ethan reached out and took her hand. Jack was going to give him so much crap. His "resolution" had clearly been so much self deluding BS.

Tali's suit felt cool and dry against his skin. "You have nothing to be embarrassed about," he said.

She gripped his hand softly. Ethan smiled and squeezed back.

* * *

Author's note: I feel a bit bad for completely glossing over what happened between Ethan and Liara after "Joining", but while I did write a description there was no place it fit naturally in this story without breaking up the flow. Suffice to say, things did not end particularly well, though there was no big angry breakup or anything.


End file.

Mass Effect, Drama, Romance